We discovered we had been less than half an hour away from Muktinath, but we discovered also that the houses that we had thought to be the village were another village. Muktinath is a nice village, much more disperse than Jarkhot or Kagbeni. Each of those villages have their own particular charm. We strolled around for a while and hesitated on going a little further. We ended up deciding that we should go back at once, as we thought it was better to be sure to arrive in Jomsom before sunset. We feared that the fatigue would delay us and the strech between Kagbeni and Jomsom was very long and without any place to sleep. I regret now not having seen the temple of the eternal fire, but we didn't get much enthusiastic after earing the impression of the american couple we had met several times the day before. Now I would also have liked to try to discern something of the mythic Thorong La (pass).

We talked with the american couple and some other people who had met on the trail about our "hotels", how bad or good who had spent the night, how we were feeling and about our plans for the day. I told before of how easy was to relate with people on the trail and how nice everyone seemed to be. I'm sure the breath taking landscape helped a lot on that as well as the gentle ways of the locals, which allways saluted us with "Namaste" and their opened smile.

We didn't pass Kagbeni on the way down, we took a short cut before reaching it. One of the reasons for taking that way was that it seemed less steepy. We were moving faster than we did the afternoon before, which was no surprise, as we were descending, but descents can be even harder than the climbings, specially for the knees. Mine were hurting me badly. We arrived the lodge in well before noon.

We stayed outside on the esplanade for a while, enjoying the sun, the (allways!) landscape and the activities of two little local girls. They were very cheeky, allways trying to open our sacks to see what was inside. The place was full, probably because it is the only cafe between Kagbeni and Jomsom, which are some hours away walking. Finally we got tired of not being served and also with the wind that began to being boring, so we went inside.

Since there wasn't any empty table available, we seated on a large table that was occupied by a german man and an english couple. The german was a funny felow. He kept joking about everything and was nice to ear his stories and laughing with his humour. For some time we thought they were all english, as the german had an almost perfect "BBC" english accent and his humour was also quite "british". They had been trekking for several days or weeks, so they were a little bit anxious for meat. The english joked that they had became unvolunteerly vegetarians during the trek. The German told us that he was dreaming with his return home, so he could buy a large roasted chicken and eat it alone at dinner. He was a great fan of roasted chicken. When he was in Mexico the year before he had some troubles getting a whole chicken for himself. They sold the chickens by quarters and they just couldn't understand why someone would want a whole bird for himself. Finaly he ended up convincing the waiter to get him 4 quarters. That was the only way he had to get *his* chicken.

The way to Jomsom was quite an experience. All the way we faced strong winds that lifted tons of sand that got inside everything, mouth, eyes and ears included. We arrived Jomsom completely covered with dust. I didn't reconise myself on the mirror, as my face was completely grey. The aspect of my eyelashes, eyebrowes and lips was specially frightening. I bet that it was impossible to get such an effect with the most sofisticated make-up. It was a real sand storm, most of the times we had no more than some few meters of visibility. The sand wasn't the only problem, as the wind was so strong that it really made our moves very difficult. Perhaps it could be helpful if we were moving the other way, I''ll try it on the next time. However, there were very few people moving North, towards Kagbeni. I think that most of people were doing the whole Annapurna circuit and I've heard that it's best done anti-clockward, maybe that's the explanation for us to see so few people going the way opposite to ours.

After about 3 hours of that hell we reached Jomsom. We stayed in an lodge near the airport, in a bedroom whith a window facing the Tilicho. After seeing that window's view it turned out very difficult to decide which was the bedroom where I ever was with a better view - this one or the other in Nagarkhot? The place looked very luxuous after the last night. It was amazing like those past 24 hours seemed to had last so long. We felt like coming back to civilization after weeks on the wilderness of the mountains. We took a long hot shower in our private bathroom and rested a bit before dinner, enjoying the sunset. They had a satelite TV on the restaurant hall, which was confortably warm, so the "return to civilization" was even more complete. Nevertheless, I would mind nothing having more time to spend up there on the wilderness of the other less confortable and more distant places.

The prices in the lodge was similar to what we were used in Kathmandu. I don't remember the prices on the restaurant, but I think we paid something like 300 or 400 R a night for the bedroom, maybe less.